In restaurants, foods such as shrimp, chicken livers and the like are received in bulk packages. The bulk packages must be broken down by counting or weighing the product into individual servings of a specified size. The individual servings are re-packaged, ready for cooking, as needed. In many instances, a special worker is required to handle this preparation of individual servings from the bulk package.
Deep fat friers are widely employed to cook the above foods in hot shortening, a wire basket being employed to submerge the product in the shortening. Although the basket commonly used has a capacity for several individual servings, no means is provided to separate the servings or portions while cooking. Therefore, after cooking, the product must be reweighed or recounted before serving to assure the correct and uniform size of the serving to customers. Unfortunately, in many instances, particularly in rush periods, customers receive short portions, which in turn leads to customer complaints.
The objective of the present invention is simply to deal completely and successfully with the above problem in a restaurant while enabling the continued use of a standard size frying basket without the necessity of redesigning or changing the standard construction thereof. The invention, which is embodied in a removable partition and cover element for the basket, enables the simultaneous cooking in the basket of several individual servings and also enables the delivery onto a plate or the like of equal size individual servings, one at a time, after complete cooking, while retaining remaining servings in the basket in a separated state until complete cooking thereof is accomplished, after which the remaining equal size servings are dispensed from the basket one at a time.
The partition or divider unit does not preclude use of the basket for cooking a single large order of a food product when this is required. In this case, the partition unit is separated from the basket and set aside.
Other features and advantages of the invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art during the course of the following description.